I feel so awful, hospital tank ammonia spike

[StrangelyNormal]

I feel so terrible. I just can't even put it into words.

I had a Boesemani rainbowfish in a hospital tank because he had a stubborn white spot, which I am assuming is a fungus, that would not go away. The rest of the tank was okay and I didn't want it to spread. I formerly had Pictus catfish in there in QT, and the filter was extremely solid because as you know catfish have extremely high bioloads.

The fungus went away, but he was left with a weird never healing hole in his scales. Nonetheless, I figured it was probably healing, though very slowly.


I just found him dead and I feel so awful. It's been years since I lost a fish for any other reason than old age or some sort of incurable sickness beyond my control. My ammonia was .25 ppm or .50 ppm and I do water changes like its a religion. I have cycled tanks before, I am not new to this. The tank never even had ammonia in it with the pictus in it. I payed close attention to it. How is it one boesemani created enough ammonia to kill it?

I'm thinking the tank went through some sort of mini cycle? Could it be from the removal of the pictus? Or the meds? Too many changes? Dirty filter? Why would this happen? But I cannot express how awful I feel.

 

[Delapool]

Sad news Perhaps keep in mind that there were a number of little things I guess that just added up. The ammonia is up but I've seen people cycle with that so meds, infection, changes, etc - unfortunately just too much but good news that you had a QT going.

What med did you use? It's possible it knocked out some bacteria.

 

[StrangelyNormal]

Mostly furan 2 and a round of kanaplex a week or so ago. This fungus started plaguing my tank after a tough school semester whereas I wasn't even sleeping much. The main tank is now fine but it was only a week or so tops that there was no fish in the tank for the filter, and even then there was still waste left behind from the pictus (which I of course cleaned up). It was likely even less than a week. So the bacteria had a source of "food" if you will.

The tank had been running fine for over a year and had two fish that pushed it's bioload to the maximum. Now there is literally a stench of ammonia coming from it.

I am horrified and confused.

Interestingly as well there were no telltale signs of poisoning on him. Ie, no red gills, no ripped fins when he was alive the day before.

 

[Delapool]

I've had my biofilter fine with those meds before but sometimes I think can be unlucky

 

[StrangelyNormal]

I may dose the whole tank with furan 2 because I'm over this fungus. It's been months of endless water changes with no result. It's still "showing" up a bit.


I also am running three filters, so it's not that it's dirty.